Skirmish on Burus
WIP The Imperial Intelligence Service Beaureau learned that Burus was being used as a temporary home for a group of smugglers. A single platoon from the Imperial Army was sent in two Lambda shuttles to exercise a warrant for their arrest. Planet creation note: Burus is a small planetoid in the Outer Rim, the second planetoid in it's star system, it is close enough to it's star to be tidally locked, and one side was always day and the other always night. The day side's temperatures were hot enough to overload the shields on their shuttles and the night side cold enough to freeze the troops if they remained there for too long.) The shuttles landed on the night size, landing and deploying. The platoon was split into two squads who searched through a series of caverns they thought might be used as a smuggling den. One of the officers was overzealous in their pursuit, and made his troopers double time it. After a half hour of searching, they found themselves surrounded by nearly fifty Barabel warriors. The overzealous officer ordered his squad to charge. The other ordered his men to provide covering fire. Both squads were armed with blaster rifles and a single light repeater was availablein each. Only the two sergeants wore blast plate armour, and the rest wore their greys. As the sergeant and his squad charged blindly forward, the more cautious sergeant ordered his men to toss their grenades. As the first sergeant was cut down by four warriors armed with old slugthrowers, the second squad fell into cover and the awarriors advanced, claws ready to tear the Imperials into pieces. Many of the unarmed warriors fell to the initial volley, but the four riflemen tore the other squad apart with their rifles. The sergeant's sidearm opened up, but did little to assist. When he noticed that the light repeater from the other squad had lost it's gunner, he advanced, firing his sidearm into the side plating of a Barabel's skull as he reared back to strike at one of the exposed troopers. He acquired the light repeater, the first shot going wild, the second burning through the armoured plating of one of the armed Barabels. The combined fire of his squad dropped another, and the repeater punched through a large boulder, splintering the rock, causing a Barabel hiding behind it to flee. One of the troopers tossed their final grenade and it landed at their feet. All of the warriors wer dead, or injured. The sergeant gave orders while still defeaned by the concussive blast of the grenades and his close proximity to the firefight. The army troopers secured the prisoners and the medics looked the squads over. Of the eighteen men who had descended from the Lambda shuttle, only ten were alive, and most of them injured. The other squads deployed on the planet had run into similar situations, though the lieutenant fared better at coordinating his defense and took fewer losses before pulling off. The sergeantr eceived a recommendation for valour on Burus. Lieutenant Orion led the platoon, returning them to the Victory-class Star Destryer the Vigilant. Imperial command was displeased with their failure to dislodge the 'smugglers'. Sergeant Palms, the only other sergeant to survive aside from the one who used the light repeater, haggled with the requisitions office and acquired additional heavy firepower. Soon they were outfitted with several armoured speeders, an additional light repeater for each squad, and two E-Web turrets mounted on two heavy speeders. Only one combat medic was made available. Thirty-six troopers entered the caverns as a unified force, with the first sergeant taking the lead, Palm taking the rear, and Orion's two squads holding the center as they pushed deeper into the caverns. None of the Barabel corpses remained, but drag marks revealed where they had gone. This also included the bodies left behind from the Imperials during their hasty retreat. They pushed on towards the nest, with atl east half of the front squad in cover and able to provide support as the others moved up. The sensors of the speeder chirped in response to a located powersource only a fraction of a second before blowing up. The sergeant was thrown like a child's dall, but most of his men were safe behidn cover. The squads all fired deeper into the cover, with the lizards using a tirret they'd cut off from a starship positioned in front of their nest for defense. The fresh grunts of his squad were firing at anything and evertthing without coordination, but the LT commanded his men to advance to add more balsters to the frunt line. The sergerant ordered his men to begin a leapfrogging advance while focusing tire on the turret emplacement. A ferw threw grenades, but the nest and turret were reinforced with starship armour and proved to be rather difficult to crack. Private James Starskipper took several breaching charges and he and another private advanced, (not the other private, he took the otherp rivate's breaching charges) rushed the gun emplacement and activated them as a defending Barabel sliced into him with their claws. The sergeant wrote a letter to the family commending him for his bravery and service.